London Riots

Aside from all the damage and chaos, this petulant and disgraceful temper tantrum is interrupting the start of the English Premier League. Now those hooligans have gone too far...nobody stops me from watching Tottenham!

But as for the mechanics of the situation, does anyone really believe this is a justifiable expression of anger? Most of the apologetic scuttlebutt I've read goes something like this: "Young people have been locked out of the economic system by evil capitalists. They have no one to advocate for them, and no hope of a future because old, white people are greedy. Therefore, the only recourse open to them is to riot like thugs and destroy private property. Furthermore, the government's proposed budget cuts deny them the ability to cloth and feed themselves. And so, reluctantly, with their back against the wall and no real options, their anger bursts forth like a righteous tidal wave against the bulwark of The System." Sound about right?

Just one problem. Well, actually there are several, but one stands out. The above line of reasoning conveniently starts the story in the middle. I'll assume for a moment that the people engaged in the riots suffer from dire economic circumstances, and that any so-called austerity measures enacted by the gov't will negatively, and directly, affect their lives. Loathe as I am to interrupt the orgy of zero personal responsibility, either the gov't has the money to subsidize people's lives, or else it doesn't. If the central apparatus can no longer afford to issue payments (the relative merits or demerits of those payments aside) then whether or not the absence of said payments will cause hardship is a moot point. The apologists never seem to weigh the possibility that decades of precisely this system, which is now top-heavy and teetering under its own grotesque weight, is a contributor to the social conditions which have now shown us their ugly fruits.

In other words, a culture of entitlement is a root cause here. Prime Minister Cameron said much the same the other day. Just go back to the days of the Great Depression in America, see the contrasts, and ponder for awhile what role principles and a sense of morality might play, and if different principles embodied by the public might be the central factor in determining the response to hard times instead of outside circumstance.